Motherhood
by Kelev
Summary: Because sometimes, being a mother turns out to be even more difficult and fulfilling than being the Avatar. A series of Mommy!Korra moments.
1. Sleep Deprivation

A/N: This is a birthday fic for a good friend on tumblr. Happy birthday, secretsecrettunnel!

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**Sleep Deprivation**

When Korra crashed into Republic City three years ago, she had been a sight that no one— least of all the Triad members she had beat up— had ever expected to see. After all, it wasn't every day one saw a wild looking water tribe girl riding through the orderly city streets on an even wilder looking polarbear dog. When everyone found out that she was in fact their new Avatar… well, things hadn't quite been the same in the city since then, and things had certainly never been the same for Korra herself.

That day seemed so long ago… yet it didn't seem so long ago as the brief nap Korra had indulged in merely five hours ago. "Come on, Nila," She pleaded as she paced, wearily swaying her tiny daughter in the crook of her arm in what she had learned was a (near) surefire last resort trick for sleep. "Mama wants to go to beeeeeeeed."

Wide blue eyes staring up at her from within the soft hand-knit blanket that Kya had given as a shower gift, the infant waved a tiny hand in a way that seemed to suggest that she was not going to go to sleep for a long time yet.

Korra had been warned by both Pema and her own mother that Nila would most likely not sleep in any regular pattern until well beyond six months of age. But no one— absolutely _no one_— warned her that could mean two hour intervals of catnaps around the clock, for_ three months straigh_t. Truthfully, the Avatar was starting to feel herself go a little loopy from lack of sleep. (The charred remains of her forgotten supper, the letter to her parents she had somehow stuck inside the icebox last week and couldn't find until this morning, and her inability to pay attention to anything for more than two minutes was testament to that.)

Still, it was hard to get mad about it. Korra was too weary to stay angry for long, and really, it was hard to keep a bad mood when Korra forced herself to breath in a calming breath and look into Nila's guileless eyes. She groaned as she longingly looked at her bed before offering her much-too-awake child a pout. "_Pfft_. If it's this bad now, maybe I should be gearing up for when you hit two. Are you ever going to cut me a break, kiddo?"

Her petulant whine might have been a bit childish, but she found herself smiling when the only response she received was an owlish blink that preceded a sneeze so ridiculously adorable, it seemed to blow away the rest of the Avatar's frustrations. Chuckling, Korra rolled her eyes and gave up on the option of sleep for the next hour. "You're lucky you're so cute."


	2. Privacy Matters

A/N: Nila's daddy will remain ambiguous for the purposes of this fic. I wanted to see Korra tackle single-motherhood on top of her Avatar duties, and frankly, I think it's an idea that has a lot of potential. For now, though, these one shots will be centered around Nila's baby/toddler years. Enjoy!

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"Korra! What's the meaning of this?"

Opening her eyes, Korra rolled her stiff neck with a few noisy pops and glanced first at the (blessedly still sleeping) infant at her right before turning to scowl at Tenzin. "Could you keep it down?" She grumbled, "You're the one constantly badgering me to continue practicing my meditation. I'd think you'd be happy I'm doing that even with all that's on my plate now."

Tenzin sighed through his nose. The afternoon's warm, bright sunshine was muted into a peaceful glow here in the meditation pavilion, and the late springtime temperatures were thankfully warm enough for Nila to be outside with Korra whenever the young Avatar was about her business. Lately, Korra had been taking the one month old everywhere, and when Nila took a nap a half an hour ago, Korra decided to brush up on her mediation instead of pursuing a nap herself. Tenzin's agitation pretty much blew the peace she had recently achieved right out of the water, though.

"_This_, Korra." He repeated a bit more calmly, though Korra could tell her former mentor was still irked by the flaring of his nose as he waved a newspaper at her.

Apparently, _this_ was an article slapped right on the front page, complete with an incriminating photo. Tenzin crossed his arms and waited for her to finish reading before speaking again. "This says that you deliberately firebent a man's eyebrows clean off his head for asking questions about Nila. Why would you _do _that?"

Okay, the peace was _totally _gone now. Enraged, Korra crumpled the entire newspaper in her fist, growling low in her throat and setting it ablaze with firebending. "That stupid moron!" She hissed, anger making her forget herself as her tone climbed higher with every word. "He went ahead and published this even when I told him not to?!"

On instinct, both turned in fearful anticipation of Nila waking up from Korra's outburst, but thankfully, the baby slept on. Leting out a breath, the young Avatar glared at the pile of ashes that was once the newspaper. "They left out that the man I firebent at was the reporter himself, Tenzin. He was stalking us around even when I told him to get lost. And when I stopped to feed Nila on the way home from Asami's... well, I guess I got mad enough to show him I meant what I said before."

Tenzin's face was capable of a great deal of the most amusing emotions, and this time his face morphed from mounting disbelief to outright horror. "So you did firebend at a man! Korra, how _could _you?"

Korra stood, feeling her stress mount. "He wasn't giving us our space! And Nila wasn't going to wait until we got back to Air Temple Island for feeding, so I swung by the park to get a quiet bench so we wouldn't be stared at." Her eyes flashed with renewed anger. "And this chump wouldn't go away, even when I told him that I had nothing to say about Nila and myself. And the pervert goes ahead and snaps a picture of me as I'm getting ready to breast feed! What did you expect me to do?"

"I expected better of you." The airbending master sighed. "You're the Avatar, and your actions are always going to be more publicized than anyone else. What you did could warrant your arrest, if you were someone other than the Avatar. You know that."

Korra sucked in a breath, trying to calm herself down. The way it fed the fire in her belly instead wasn't a good sign. "Well, Lin knows that I am not in the habit of breaking laws willy-nilly anymore. I seriously think that this isn't even going to be an issue with her. Frankly, I'm surprised that _you're _the one all up in arms about this. I thought you were on my side!"

The flinch that Tenzin tried to stifle made Korra pause, and a moment later she realized her tone had returned to a shout loud enough to wake the baby. Unfortunately it was too late, and Nila's little fists curled and a tiny, reedy cry erupted from within the swaddling blanket. Bending down to gently scoop up the tiny bundle of rage, Korra murmured soothing words as she swayed in a slow, rocking motion that didn't seem to do much good for the moment. She didn't notice that Tenzin hadn't left until the airbending master cleared his throat, holding out his arms. "May I?" He asked, much more gently than Korra had expected.

The man's grey eyes had softened considerably in the few moments of watching her interact with her child, and when she reluctantly passed Nila over and watched him hold her as he had once held Rohan, she couldn't find it in her to be truly upset with him. After all, he was a staunch traditionalist, and always would be when it came to laws and social convention. Her former anger had simmered down to a manageable irritation by the time Nila had been sufficiently calmed, and it seemed that Tenzin had calmed down as well. "I'm sorry Korra. Sometimes I forget what it's like to be a new parent, and I had forgotten about how... _persistent _the media can be when it comes to children of famous people. Even I had done something that was vaguely inappropriate when the press found out about Jinora's airbending abilities."

Taking her daughter back, Korra snorted, a grin working it's way over her features as they started back down towards the courtyard. "Let me guess, you airbent their clothes up over the cameras?"

"I-" Tenzin's eyebrows shot up, and he pinned her with an astonished glare. "How did you know?"

Her grin grew wider. "Let's just say that Pema tells the greatest stories about you."


	3. Discovery

Pregnancy was something that had never, ever once crossed Korra's mind as something that she would experience. Being the Avatar, she had always assumed that she would be too busy for such a thing... not to mention her heavy metal poisoning that she had suffered when she was eighteen had made her believe that having children at all was an impossibility.

So she cursed herself for her stupidity when she realized that assuming was not the same as cold hard truth, and that there were always exceptions to a rule. _Assuming _that her reproductive state was thoroughly screwed up since the poisoning, she had never bothered to use protection when it came to sex... nor required her partner to use any. She groaned and rubbed the heels of her hands into her eyes, feeling almost as if she wanted to cry... or laugh at the situation she had gotten herself into. _Stupid, stupid, stupid. I should have known better._

There were signs too, signs she had ignored or mistaken for something else, something insignificant. Her sense of smell for the last three weeks had heightened to an almost alarming level, to the point where Pema's (otherwise delicious) mushroom stew had been so strong that Korra had felt ill. The feeling of nausea had brought such a wave of horrible memories of her battle to recover from the poisoning that she had rushed from the table in her hurry to leave, a mild panic attack striking her before she could go and meditate. That had rattled her (panic attacks were few and far in between, but still a side effect she had yet to shake), and thereafter she seemed to be more easily prone to tears- and over the weirdest things, too. A song on the radio (a lively lindy hop) had her throat tighten, and seeing little Rohan preform a simple marble trick had prompted real live tears from her, much to her horror.

Desperate for answers, she went to Pema. Katara was gone- a thought that never failed to bring on _more _tears, pregnancy aside- and her own mother was halfway across the world. Pema would know what to say, surely. And if not... well...

"It sounds like you might be suffering from a hormonal imbalance, Korra." The woman smiled kindly, though there was a shadow in her eyes that lingered when Korra admitted that she had been having a panic attack or two. No one on the island could forget the sight of the Avatar battling horrific physical and mental trauma, after all, and Korra suspected that everyone worried she might relapse.

However, it had been well known that Korra had only just recently ended a relationship, and when Pema had tacked on the question of "Had you been using protection at all before your breakup?" Korra felt a different sort of panic. "What... I..." _Why would she ask me that? _ "I thought Kya said that the poison had ruined most of my chances for.. um..." It was awkward even _saying_ the word. "I know that Su got it all out of my system, but still. I thought I'd never need to worry about that sort of thing."

The shadow of worry lifted a little from Pema's hazel eyes, the notion bringing on something both familiar and new to think about. "It is still a possibility, Korra. It can't hurt just to check it out. If you _are _pregnant, then we need to know about it as soon as possible."

So that was how Korra found herself in her room, taking the water from the pitcher that sat on her bed stand and allowing it to cover her hands and glow; the flow of chi in her hands melding with the water and sinking into her body, searching out any abnormalities that might be within. _What should I look for?_ She wondered uneasily, slowing the motions and concentrating harder. _A heartbeat? A different energy underneath my own, like Raava's?_

When she paused over her womb and allowed the water's chi flow to spread out, she sucked in a sharp breath as an impossibly faint, rapid, and very much _alive_ rhythm made itself known. The chi collected into the tiny bundle was unique even as it was connected to her own; and an even tinier heartbeat could be felt fluttering, stirring it's own miniscule currents of life. Too stunned to hold the flow, Korra dropped the water onto the floor; burying her head in her hands as she realized what she had discovered would change absolutely _everything _in her life... and it was too late to change anything about it.

_Stupid, stupid, stupid._

She stayed like that for nearly an hour, her head in her hands, her mind a whirl of thoughts that swung back and forth between panic and a very slow growing wonderment. _I'm going to be a mother... I've got the world to try to keep in balance, and now I've got someone who will be entirely dependent on me for the next seventeen or eighteen years._ Boy was _that_ a terrifying thought. Oddly enough, it was also a strange comfort, to be needed. The Air Nation had taken up the mantle of peacekeepers, something that had once been the Avatar's sole backbreaking duty. It had been both a relief and a terrible blow to her self worth when it had first happened, but now... _I might be able to do this. I never knew I wanted this, but now that I think about it, it's not so bad after all. _ Challenges were usually relished by Korra, and she couldn't deny that this was going to be an enormous undertaking. Being a single parent was going to be hard enough, being the Avatar on _top _of that was going to be the hardest and (hopefully) most rewarding thing that Korra could ever think of accomplishing.

_Is this what Aang felt like? He and Katara probably were expecting to be expecting, though, so maybe not..._

Thinking of Katara always brought a fresh wave of sadness, and she found herself touching the necklace that the venerable old woman had given her just before she passed on. A touch for luck, a touch for a hope of some otherworldly wisdom (though Korra still felt as unenlightened as ever), and a touch to reassure herself that she had been believed in- even when things had been at their worst, Katara had always been a very firm believer in Korra as both the Avatar and as an individual. _She would have been happy for me. _The realization came unbidden, surprising enough to prompt Korra to sit up and lift her head up a bit. _She would have laughed away my worry and congratulated me, telling me stupid baby stories of Tenzin, Kya, and Bumi over a cup of tea._

The reminder of Tenzin prompted a small laugh from her, and with that she stood, giving her (still perfectly flat) abdomen a long look before squaring her shoulders and striding through the door to tell everyone the news. _I can do this. I'm not alone, and I have friends who will be with me through this._


End file.
